


Born To Die

by ViolentVioletEye



Series: Alone Together [2]
Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, DadSchlatt, Depression, Gen, Mental Breakdown, Panic Attacks, Stress, Teenagers, This is a thousand or so words of schlatt trying his fucking best, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-05
Updated: 2021-01-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 10:09:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28580265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ViolentVioletEye/pseuds/ViolentVioletEye
Summary: He heard something gasping for breath so loudly he could almost feel their lungs shaking, but when he went to tell Tommy to breathe in through his nose for four seconds, he couldn’t push the words out, and Tommy wasn’t in the car, and that’s when he realized he was the one hyperventilating.
Relationships: Jschlatt & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF)
Series: Alone Together [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2093832
Comments: 19
Kudos: 189





	Born To Die

**Author's Note:**

> TW for a panic attack/breakdown, descriptions of death, such as people being blown up, limbs, etc etc, and unhealthy coping skills. Aka Schlatt shoves shit down and moves on. To understand wtf is going on, I suggest reading the first part of this series, Rät.

Schlatt’s hands had been shaking all morning.

_Don’t make me sad, don’t make me cry._

Tommy didn’t say anything about it. He wasn’t even sure the kid noticed. He had his earbuds in like usual as they did their usual morning routine. That often consisted of them getting up five or ten minutes late, Schlatt pouring himself some cheap coffee while Tommy ate some sugary cereal for breakfast, and then they’d go out to their car that was at least a _little_ older than Tommy and they’d spend the next fifteen minutes stuck in traffic before they’d finally get to Tommy’s school. And Schlatt would tell him to be good, and Tommy would either grunt, flip him off, or just not reply at all as he got out of the car and joined the crowds of his peers as they all moved like cattle towards the front doors.

_Sometimes love is not enough._

Schlatt spilled some of his coffee, he nearly dropped the keys twice and it took him at least five times to stab them into the ignition, and he felt like he was one failed start away from ramming his horns through the dashboard when the car finally started. He didn’t tell Tommy to be good that morning, but Tommy had left without batting an eye and was met up by one of his friends. She had long purple hair and talked very loudly. Tommy was quiet as he nodded along with whatever she was saying. Normally, Schlatt pulled out of the parking lot immediately, but he sat there, hands trembling on the wheel until most of the morning crowd was gone and he finally had the strength to drive.

_And the road gets tough._

He was honestly kind of offended by it. Schlatt, Jebediah or not, was not a man that _shook._ Do you have any idea how many debates he’s been in? He didn’t hop into Presidentary. He’s been a mayor, a senator, the CEO of his own fucking company. He was born and bred blue blood, all from his father as his mother had been a prostitute that abandoned him on his father’s doorstep, not even a day after he had been born. He had been raised under a cruel hand, in the presence of his father’s alcohol bottles, with his half-disgraced father burning his gaze into the back of his head throughout his life.

_I don’t know why._

He didn’t _shake._ He didn’t shake when he was old enough to learn that it was a sign of weakness. He didn’t shake when he became senator, and when he fought to keep that position. He didn’t shake when he faced a board full of his cruel father’s equally cruel peers and took the company that was rightfully his and kick them to the curb while he raised it into something to be _proud_ of.

_Keep making me laugh._

He didn’t shake when he ran for President. He didn’t shake when he exiled Wilbur Soot and Tommy Innit. He didn’t shake when he felt the rumble of the TNT going off underneath him. He didn’t shake when he saw Tubbo become a bloody mess on the fucking stage before that was torn apart too.

_Let’s go get high._

He didn’t shake when he held Quackity’s hand, the arm attached to _nothing,_ because he hadn’t pulled him out of the way of the next bunch of TNT in time. But he had been out of range just enough that he was only thrown off his feet, still gripping his Vice President’s hand. He imagined it was the only limb that hadn’t been shredded into millions of pieces by the shrapnel that had been left in some of the TNT.

_The road is long, we carry on._

Christ, Wilbur had lost it, hadn’t he?

_Try to have fun in the meantime._

And it was Schlatt’s fault. He knew it was.

_Come take a walk on the wild side._

When he ran a red light and nearly caused an accident, he realized tears were blurring his vision, and he needed to pull over. He pulled into the abandoned parking lot of a club that was only opened at night, and so it was empty at nearly eight o’clock in the morning. When he parked and he leaned back in his seat, gasping for breath, he lifted his hands to run them through his hair and found they were still shaking.

_Let me kiss you hard in the pouring rain._

He screamed. It was weak, quiet enough that it was lost in the loud morning rush. But it was a scream nonetheless, and he couldn’t remember the last time he screamed. Probably the festival. That bloody, horrible festival. He screamed, and the tears fell, and he slammed his shaking hands down on his wheel, slamming his head against the horn twice before he could feel a headache coming, and then he just threw it back against the seat.

_You like your girls insane._

He heard something gasping for breath so loudly he could almost feel their lungs shaking, but when he went to tell Tommy to breathe in through his nose for four seconds, he couldn’t push the words out, and Tommy wasn’t in the _car,_ and that’s when he realized _he_ was the one hyperventilating. He, Jason Schlatt, was having an anxiety attack. No. Not an anxiety attack. A whole mental breakdown. And he didn’t have Tommy, or his own Schlatt, here for him.

_So choose your last words, this is the last time_

His eyes snapped to the radio, which he didn’t even remember turning on. But he must have. He did every morning. Because Tommy rarely ever talked in the morning, because of those earbuds that he always kept stuck in his ears. Schlatt turned it on to fill the silence, catch some news, and see what people were listening to nowadays. But he knew this song. He knew this song because it was one of _Quackity’s favorite songs—_

_'Cause you and I, we were born to die—_

He jabbed his finger against the radio button so hard he was pretty sure he did something to his finger and that that button would never work again, but he didn’t care. He was sobbing just moments later, hunching over his steering wheel as he crossed his arms on the dashboard and dragged his nails across the rough material it was made of. He was angry. At the world. At their shitty car. At the unhealthy crap he had to feed Tommy who was a growing boy _goddammit_ because it was all they could afford. He was angry at the subpar education Tommy was getting, which he couldn’t even grasp sometimes because Wilbur, that _bastard,_ had dragged a _twelve-year-old_ into a _fucking war_ and the kid was going to be sixteen in just _two months_ and Schlatt didn’t know what to do and he felt like he was sinking and he _was_ he was _sinking fast and he didn’t know what to fucking do because they were all alone and it was all his fucking fa_

When his head was clear again, somehow he had crawled himself into the back of the car. He was laid over the backseat, hands pressed against his heaving chest. His eyes felt itchy and swollen, and black dots drifted past his vision as he stared up at the car’s ceiling. The superglue he used to keep the fake and cheap velvet up on that one spot was beginning to peel off. He needed to take care of that soon.

Though he was aware, he felt like he wasn’t in his own body. But he still sat up, watched himself pick up his phone and check the time. It was eight fifty-eight. He had been having a breakdown in his car for nearly fifty minutes. He was going to be late for work. His shift was at nine. He called his workplace, made up some bullshit excuse about how the electricity got turned off in his apartment and so his alarm didn’t go off, and he’ll be there as soon as possible, yes ma’am, won’t take more than fifteen minutes even though it’s a thirty-minute drive. And when that was done and over with, he crawled back into the driver seat, started the car back up after three failed starts, and merged back out into the roads.

He got to work about twenty minutes later, pulling on his Pizza King hat before tying his apron.

 _“You are twenty minutes late!”_ His boss shrieked at him. He didn’t bat an eye and instead resisted the urge to correct her and tell her that he was actually only eighteen minutes late, thank you very much. She shrieked a lot. It was normal. He got used to it after his third day. The ram and hybrid slurs had taken a little longer, but after the first week, he was pretty much numb to it.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” was all he said, and he didn’t mean a single word.

“Just get your ass to work, before I kick you to the curb!” She screamed at him, and he rolled his eyes after his back was to her. She wouldn’t do that. The reason why she had the workers she had was because they were the few desperate enough to put up with her shit for this nine-to-five piece of shit job. If Schlatt wasn’t feeding someone else beside him, then he would have quit the first hour in. But, he had Tommy. And while this job made it so he could only afford shit meals, it did help him afford meals in general. And, sometimes, they even made enough for rent _and_ food. A thrilling opportunity, really. Tommy had offered to get a job, but Schlatt told him it would be useless unless he wanted some of his own spending money, because he wouldn’t be taking his check. He knew it was stubborn of him. But it wasn’t for his pride. He just wanted the kid to be just that, a _kid._ He had already taken so much from him himself, and Wilbur had taken even more, and don't even get him started with Dream—

He had so much to make up for that kid. So much so that he knew he would never be able to. But he could at least get some things right. He could at least do _something_ right, in his miserable, corrupt, half-blueblood life. So he pushed his morning out of his head, was thankful that his hands were finally still as he went into the cooler to grab some sauce to fill the half-empty pan in the line, and instead focused on making it to five where would get dinner, go home, make it for them, deal with whatever mood Tommy was in that day, and then pass out on the couch. He would do it all again tomorrow, without that _ridiculous_ moment of weakness.

Tommy was all he had. And he couldn’t afford to lose him.

**Author's Note:**

> The song is Born to Die, by Lana Del Rey.
> 
> Pizza King is an Indiana native pizza chain. Ahhhh oh no, now you all know my state-good luck finding me in all the CORN motherfuckers


End file.
